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Archive for the ‘Rentboy’ Category

Gustaf / Jim E. Brown / Rentboy (Ukie Club, Philadelphia, PA, May 22, 2024) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Gustaf, Jim E. Brown, Johnny Brenda's, Philadelphia, PA, Rentboy on May 22, 2024| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: May 22, 2024] Gustaf / Jim E. Brown / Rentboy

Two years ago I wrote this:

I saw Gustaf open for Idles and they were weird and wonderful and someone I definitely wanted to see live again–preferably headlining.  They have a very late 1980’s punk aesthetic with spoken words and random sounds.  Plus a lot of humor.  I was really excited for this show.  But by the time it came around, having missed a whole bunch of shows that I was really looking forward to, I wound up blowing off this one as well.

Shame, really.

And I can’t believe the same thing happened this time too.  I had shows lined up from Saturday through Thursday.  I didn’t think I’d make them all, but here’s the fourth night in a row that I couldn’t go to a show.

Tonight’s was because my daughter’s school had an awards night scheduled for tonight.  So obviously I’m going to that instead.  But the timing, ugh.

The two openers are bands/performers I have missed in the past.

Jim E. Brown opened for Wax Jaw.

Poet and Artist/Activist Jim E. Brown was born in Manchester on September 10, 2001, just one day before the 911. He is an alcoholic and has several degenerative conditions.

His YouTube videos say

19 year old British pop sensation Jim E. Brown returns with his latest album, Torture

His music is weird and comically dark.  It makes weird sense that he’d be paired with Gustaf.

Over simple melodies, Brown speak/screams lyrics to songs like “I texted you a photo of the sunset and you never responded” and “I know I’m going to die of a stroke.”  Sounds interminable and wonderful.

Rentboy has been an opener for two different bands that I didn’t see.  They are a Philadelphia based disco collective whose new blurb says

Rentboy is the musical project of Bobby Brown. After three releases of increasingly lush, Americana-influenced dance pop, Rentboy’s next EP, “Get Worse” is a hard left turn. Mashing together the minimalist aggression of 2000s garage rock and the mangled production of hyper pop, the lead single “Aperol Spritz” sounds like a late night walk home from a particularly decadent party you can’t remember but wouldn’t want to forget.

I didn’t think I’d like  them all that much but the one song I listened to is weird and fun.

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Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul / Rentboy (Johnny Brenda’s, Philadelphia, PA, March 29, 2023) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Bolis Pupul, Charlotte Adigéry, Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul, Johnny Brenda's, Philadelphia, PA, Rentboy on March 29, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: March 29, 2023] Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul / Rentboy

Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul put out an album (with a very cool cover) in 2022 that was on most Year End lists.  Musically it is described as effortlessly propulsive electro pop, but lyrically it is sharp and targeted.

Cultural appropriation and racism. Social media vanity. Post-colonialism and political correctness. These are not talking points that you’d ordinarily hear on the dancefloor but Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul are ripping up the rulebook with their debut album Topical Dancer. The Ghent-based duo, who broke out with their 2019 Zandoli EP on Soulwax’s record label DEEWEE, are rare storytellers in electronic music: they take the temperature of the time and funnel them into their playful synth concoctions – never didactic and always with a knowing wink.

Their new studio record – which cements them as a duo under both their names for the first time and is co-written and co-produced by Soulwax – is both a triumph of kaleidoscopic electro-pop and “a snapshot of how we think about pop culture in the 2020s.” It captures Charlotte and Bolis’s essence as musical collaborators and the conversations they’ve had over the past two years on tour, as well as their perspectives as Belgians with an immigrant background, Charlotte with Guadeloupean and French-Martinique ancestry and Bolis being of Chinese descent.

It’s not really my type of thing, but I thought it would be really interesting to experience.  If i had less going on this week, I would have tried harder to get to the show.

Rentboy is a Philadelphia based disco collective whose last album, Memory Forever, is a meditation on body memory and queer musical history

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Barrie / Rentboy (Johnny Brenda’s, Philadelphia, PA, May 11, 2022) [DID NOT ATTEND]

Posted in Barrie, Johnny Brenda's, Philadelphia, PA, Rentboy on May 11, 2022| Leave a Comment »

[DID NOT ATTEND: March 29, 2023] Barrie / Rentboy

Barrie is a singer that I know exclusively from NPR Music.  I enjoyed a song or two from her, but it seems very unlikely that I would have gone to this show.   I’m a little surpirsed I included it in my list of shows to check out.

Rentboy is a Philadelphia based disco collective whose last album, Memory Forever, is a meditation on body memory and queer musical history.  They seem a little too disco for Barrie’s gentler sound.

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